1. Field of the Disclosure
The disclosure relates to an injection molding module, more particularly to an injection molding module that is able to prevent a fiber component that is present in a plastic material to be injection molded from damaging a surface of a molded product. The disclosure also relates to an injection molding method utilizing the injection molding module.
2. Description of the Related Art
In recent years, for the process of injection molding plastic materials, in order to enhance the rigidity, surface smoothness, brightness and other characteristics of the molded products to meet the consumers' demands, a great number of fiber components (such as glass fiber, carbon fiber, etc.) are added to the plastic material.
Referring to FIG. 1, a conventional injection molding module 1 is shown to include a male mold 11 and a female mold 12 that are fitted in with each other and that cooperate with each other to define a cavity 13. The male mold 11 is formed with a cooling runner 14 that is in spatial communication with the cavity 13 and the outside of the conventional injection molding module 1. During the injection molding operation, plastic material is injected into and fills the cavity 13 by an injection nozzle 15 through the cooling runner 14 from the outside of the conventional injection molding module 1, and is then finally cooled to form the finished molded product.
However, addition of the fiber components into the plastic material during the injection molding operation as mentioned above tends to create a new problem that is not encountered when the plastic material is free of fiber components. Specifically, when the plastic material that contains the fiber components enters the cavity 13 from the cooling runner 14, the fiber components tend to continuously impact the inner surface of the female mold 12 that faces the cooling runner 14 (as indicated by the letter A in FIG. 1). Consequently, the inner surface of the female mold 12 is unavoidably scratched by the plastic material, which leads to damaged appearance of the molded product, e.g., having mist-like defects. Such molded products cannot meet the consumers' requirements for brightness and smoothness. In addition, once the inner surface of the female mold 12 is damaged, the entire injection molding process will be forced to shut down for repairing the conventional injection molding module 1. Hence, not only are extra time and manpower needed, but the shutdown of the production lines also results in a reduction in productivity. Furthermore, in this conventional injection molding module 1, the cooling runner 14 extends in a single direction to the cavity 13 from the outside. After the molded product is cooled down and shaped, a residue of the plastic material left in the cooling runner 14 is connected to the molded product and needs to be removed, increasing both the production cost and time. Evidently, there is plenty of room for improvement in the conventional injection molding module 1.